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Fiction

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Attrition.Novel.

Ireland, 1927.

A
young housemaid, Kitty Coyne, works for the local headmaster, Jonathan Flanagan
and his wife, Cora. As well as household duties she helps Cora care for the
three young children, however she resents this and is annoyed by the privileges
bestowed on the Flanagans by their birthright.

Troubled
by her upbringing and living with an abusive mother, Kitty will do anything to improve
her life. She opportunistically kills the Flanagan’s son hoping to ruin their
ideal life and in the belief that she will be able to comfort Jonathan.

Consumed
by grief Cora is unable to look after herself or her family. Kitty tries to
take over Cora’s role to impress Jonathan but soon realises that he is only
concerned for his wife. Kitty decides that Cora must go.

When
Cora is found dead at the bottom of a well it is labelled a tragic accident,
however trauma to her skull indicates otherwise. After a brief investigation
Kitty is put on trial but her juvenile status saves her from the gallows.
Instead she is sentenced to life in Mountjoy Prison. While incarcerated she is taken in by the Sisters
of Charity and then vanishes from the official prison system.

Kitty
soon realises that her only way out is the beat the nuns at their own game and
she convinces them that she is truly repentant. She eventually becomes Sr.
Vincent and begins to supervise young women at a home for unwed mothers. Her
caring exterior slips now and then, and her old behaviours are never far away.

England, 1941.

As part of Operation Pied Piper some Irish nuns are sent to care for children in England, who are fleeing the Blitz. Some children die under the care of Sr. Vincent and eventually an investigation begins, instigated by another nun who is wary of Sr. Vincent. On the verge of being exposed Sr. Vincent plots to get rid of her suspicious colleague. The orphanage they are working in suffers a direct hit by the blitzkrieg but Sr. Vincent uses this in her favour. She kills her colleague in the aftermath of the bombing and escapes. Now presumed dead, Sr. Vincent leaves her veil behind and Kitty Coyne uses the opportunity to start over. Again.

Bitten By A Dog On Tuesday. Novel.

John Divine is an animal rescue worker who turns vigilante and sets about hunting down those who have intentionally caused pain to helpless animals. Unwittingly, one of the abusers he accosts is the teenage son of a work colleague, who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. As John gets deeper and deeper into his vicious acts of retribution he can no longer reconcile his beliefs with his actions and he begins to unravel. John’s past begins to come to the fore through dreams and memories, which sheds new light on the deeper psychical mechanisms at play that have manifested in his murderous behaviour. Every action in life has a knock on effect in the greater scheme of things and one childhood incident set a trajectory for John from which he cannot escape.